- -554 - HIXON V; SCHOOL- DISTRICT OF MARION. [187- • . • HIXON V. SCHOOL DISTRICT OF IVinmo..-4.
4-3107 • Opinion . delivered June 5, 1933: 1. LICErsisEs oLD AGE PENSION TAX.—A tax of one per cent, of the face value of all Stte and &minty warrants . , to be deducted by the State 'Treasurer and by the county treasurers to provide a fund for old age pensions, held not a "privilege tax." 2. TAXATION—EXCISE T . A.x.—A tax of one per cent, of the face value of , all State, and county warrants to provide a fund for old age pensions, under Acts . 1933, No. 271,. held not an excise tax. 3. TAXATION—PROPERTY TAX.—A tax on the face value of all State and county warrants to provide a fund for old age pensions held a "property" tax and void for want of uniformity. 4. TAXATION— DOUBLE TAXATION. —Acts 1933, 'No. 271, imposing a • tax on the , right to convert State.and county warrants into money, is void as subjecting the ownership of the warrants to an unequal • burden, since the money . into which the warrants are converted ig ' also 'subject to taxation. Appeal from Crittenden Circuit Court, First Division; G. E. ,Keek, Judge; affirmed. R. H. Berry, for, appellant. R. V. Wheeler and S. V. Neely, for appellee. CHAS. T. COLEMAN, Special Chief Justice. Act No. 271-of the Acts of 1933 creates an 'old age pension cora-
ARK.J HIXON V. SCHOOL DISTRICT OF MARION. 555 mission, composed of the Governor, the Auditor of State and the Treasurer of State, and appropriates $3,000,000. for old age pensions during the current biennium. To provide a fund for the payment of such pensions, the act requires the State Treasurer and the county treasurers to deduct one per cent. of the face value of all warrants Paid by them, and deposit the amounts so 'deducted in the State treasury to the credit of the Old Age Pension Furid. The validity of the act, in so far as it levies a tax' on warrants, is challenged on constitutional grounds. Section 5 of article 16 of the Constitution provides as follows : "All property subject to taxation shall be taxed according to its value, that value to be ascertained in such manner as the General Assembly shall 'direct, making the same equal and uniform throughout the State: No one species of property from Which . a tax 'May be collected shall be taxed higher than another species of property of equal value." The tax imposed by the act is not levied on all property subject to taxation, but only on the particular species of property represented by State and coUnty warrants. If therefore it is a tax on property, it obviously violates the uniformity requirement. The tax is plainly riot a privilege tax. The right to collect debts, whether from municipalities or from individuals, is not a privilege in the legal acceptation of the' term. Moreover, the power to tax privileges implies the power to destroy them, and, since the Constitution prescribes no . limit on privilege taxes, the tax levied by this act, if it were a tax of that character, could be increased • to any per cent. of the face value of the warrant without encountering constitutional restriction.: A tax on warrants has none of the characteristics' of an excise tax. There is no exact definitiOn of excises, but ordinarily they are duties laid on the manufacture, • sale or consumption of conimodities, or upon certain call-incts or oc c upations, and are generally referable to the police power of the State. • Pollock V. Trust Company, 157 U. S. 429, 15 S. Ct. 673. _ In substance and in legal effect, the tax is a tax on property.
HIXON_X-SGHOOL . DISTMCT -OF MARION.' -- No definitiofi of property can .be framed which does not include the right of ownership. Property -therefore,. in its 'broad and legal sense, is not •only the physical thing: which may be the. subje t of -ownership, but is the ownership itself. The essential attributes of ownership are'Alio rights of dominion, possession, enjoyment and disposition (1. •Blackstone, Com. 138; Buchanan v. Warley, 245. U. S. 60, 38 S. Ct. 16; Bracevilla v: People, 147 Ill. 66, 35 N. E . . 62, 22 .L. R. A. 340, 37 Am. St. Rep. 206).; and these rights are included within the protective prOVisions of the Constitution to tbe same extent as the physical things .to which they pertain. Terrace v. Thony: son,.263 V...S:197, 44 S. Ct, 15. A tax on s one of- these essential attributes is therefore a tax on ownership, and a -tax-on ownership is a tax on property. Thompson v: Kreutzel:, 11.2 Miss. 165, 72 So. 891. A: warrant represents . •a. Certain valne • in money.. Ownership of the warrant involves the right to receive and possess- the money. This right- is an attribute of ownership; and therefore of proPert; and a tax on its exercise . or enjoyment is a tax on property: When 'a State . or county warrant is paid in money, the money itself is subject to the ordinary tax-es applicable, to. all other property.. If the, right to convert the warrant-. into money is• taxed,. and the money itself is also taxed, the ownership of the larrant is subjected to .unequal burden,• and• uniformity of taxation is destroyed.' -,Barnes v. Jones, 139 Miss. 675, 103 SO. 773; City of Brookfield v. -Tooey, 1.41 Mo. 619, 43 S. W. 387; Malin v. County, 27 N. D. 140, 145 N. W. 582; Yatio. Pfister, 117 Cal. 83, 48 Pad. 1012; Cook County v. Fair-bank, 222 Ill. 578, 78 N. E. 895; -Spokane Company• v. County, 70 Wash. 48, 126 Pac, 54; Res . er v. _County, 48 Ore.- 326, 86 Pac. 595. The tax sought to be imposed by the act contravenes § 5 of article, 16 of the Constitution, and is void. Judgment affirmed. BASIL BAKER, S. BRUNDIDGE, C. M...BUCK, S. M..CASEY, O. A. 6RAVES and J. D. HEAD, Special Justices, concur.-
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